Who makes the cut for an invitation to the bridal shower?

(MCT photo )

March 13, 2013|By Katie Mercado, For The Baltimore Sun

One of my bridesmaids recently asked me for my bridal shower guest list. Who knew that would be so hard for me? I found myself researching etiquette and trends on who from the wedding invite list also gets an invite to the bridal shower.

Well, the research didn’t help! In most cases the shower is only for women, which was my preference anyway, so that part was easy. But from what I was reading half of the people say it's proper to invite everyone (at least all women) from the wedding list to the shower, while the other half say that’s complete old school and it’s okay to invite who ever you want.

Now I’m obviously not very traditional and our wedding certainly isn’t formal/proper so I initially didn’t feel like I needed to follow the wedding list exactly as I put together the bridal shower list. But then I started to feel bad as I was leaving people off. Would they be offended? Would they notice they weren’t invited to the shower? What if they asked me about it?

So then I started to include everyone. Except in that instance we were looking at 100 women all sitting around essentially watching me open presents for hours. And that doesn’t even sound fun to me, the person opening the presents.

Eventually after making two different lists, I considered that not all would attend the shower, including those out of town or who know Sam but not me personally. And of those people, they wouldn’t be offended or probably even notice. And it would make the event more intimate, with the people that really know, love and support me in this journey. It will also help my bridesmaids from scowling at the thought of planning a party for 100 people!

So what did I decide? Well, the list I provided to my bridesmaids has closer to 60 people on it and I feel totally comfortable in my decision! Just remember brides, bigger isn’t always better.